


Under Watchful Eye

by knockoutqueenoftheunderworld



Category: Nancy Drew (Video Games)
Genre: Character Study, F/M, HER Interactive, Last Train to Blue Moon Canyon, POV Outsider, god charleena is my fave, i am francy trash send help, i wrote this at 1 am
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-01-23
Updated: 2016-01-23
Packaged: 2018-05-15 18:29:09
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,120
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5795293
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/knockoutqueenoftheunderworld/pseuds/knockoutqueenoftheunderworld
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Charleena is a romance writer, and definitely a good one, as evidenced by her fair number of bestsellers. A good love story is never told, it takes shape; and every time that dark-haired Hardy boy sees Nancy Drew, Charleena wonders if she's in one of her romance novels.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Under Watchful Eye

Her fingers flew, skittering over keys and structuring sentences as quickly as Charleena had trained them to do so in her early years at university, when she was merely one of thousands of hopefuls, the blunt history enthusiast and hopeless romantic.  It was only when she combined these two passions that she struck gold, so to speak, with  _A Shop Without Wares_ , her debut novel into the writing world, a romance set during the Civil War.

Charleena had observed many romances in her lifetime, on television and her friends' experiences and the countless atrocities of movie couples.  And that wasn’t counting the ones in her own life. One could consider her an expert on romance.

The jarring of the train bothered Charleena little; the tendrils binding her tale were slowly weaving together, with only a few slight hiccups; there were characters that wanted to expand on their story, and they wouldn't leave her alone.  As always, she was dutiful to their needs.

She had seen it all, taken notes and spiraled stories out of the love in her life, letting the emotions and situations take their toll on her characters, allowing them to live on the page until they seemed to dance right off of it and become a friend or a lover to the reader.  So many emotions and traits of characters were drawn from her own life that her novels became very personal very quickly, and early on she had begun to watch people and assess their behavior for future reference.

Lori Girard and Tino Balducci, for example, displayed careful, delicate behavior around one another that had not escaped Charleena's clever perceptions.  Former flames, perhaps, or lovers forced apart by circumstance, maybe some miscommunication and there was a bit of apologetic, instinctive body language from the police detective.

Yes, Charleena knew a romance when she saw one, be it through letters or interactions that took place before her very eyes.

And a ridiculous teenage romance was steadily working its way into her novel without her permission or guidance.

One thing she told her publisher when they bothered her about pumping out another painstakingly carved novel was that  _a good love story is never told, it takes shape all on its own. I just nudge it along_.

The comment had gotten her more than a few rolled eyes and huffed breaths of annoyance and the occasional longing sigh of a fellow romantic, but she knew to her very core that it was the truth.

The two amateur boy detectives had the appearance of a somewhat conventional duo, but they had a fascinating dynamic, reflecting and deflecting each other all at once. Charleena had never been able to grasp the love of brotherhood as well as the love of a more non-platonic nature, but these Hardy boys inspired her to no end.  Perhaps she should write in Doug Calla's brother to have more significance, she thought as she laid out the seating and layout of the room for the next scene she was to write.

Their pretty red-haired companion, Nancy Drew, had a spark to her (along with a familiar voice) and had taken to the mystery of the train quickly, almost ravenous for answers as she probed Charleena's mind for more information.  Charleena knew an interrogation anywhere, but she let it commence.  Her assistant remembered Nancy well, and evidently she could be relentless in her pursuits.

Nancy would pass Charleena constantly to talk to the boys in the dining room, and perhaps that's where Charleena's whole trial began.

The dark-haired Hardy—Frank—had shining brown eyes and was lean but muscular, calmer, more serious, quieter than his blonde brother Joe. He was tall, dark and handsome; Frank was the picture of a dreamy, mysterious protagonist. His voice, however, gave him away.

When Charleena needed pause to rest her eyes or sip her coffee, she could channel her efforts to hear the devoted resonance in Frank's tone as he spoke to Nancy.  His voice was consciously deeper when she was around, his voice went up at the end of his sentences when he addressed her.  Often he spoke to her or about her with something akin to reverence.  His chiding of his brother became fiercer when Nancy was present, he was louder, eager to command attention, to be the prime focus of the room.

Physically watching them interact was something Charleena considered to be even more unbearable.

Frank mirrored Nancy, he sat up straight to appear taller, he couldn't seem to meet her eyes for more than a few seconds.  He spoke about his job and his car and the classes in which he excelled, unintentionally talking himself up; Joe sat beside him and quietly tapped his exasperation out, occasionally giving his brother looks of pity or annoyance, sometimes both.  Frank was besotted, and somehow, the girl detective whom Charleena had realized was observant and clever, failed to notice.

Yet Nancy leaned forward as she shared insights to Frank, her legs crossed and uncrossed beneath the table, when she walked with the brothers she brushed shoulders with Frank at every step.  They touched unnecessarily when they handed each other things and they shared secret smiles.  Whether or not Nancy knew it, she liked him too.  But Frank, he looked at her like Dirk Valentine would have looked at Frances Humber, like she hung the stars or she was made of gold or flowers grew in her footsteps, so full of childish wonder that Charleena wondered if she was in a romance novel herself, watching the two of them dance a slow, tender waltz around each other.

Charleena knew a forming romance when she saw one.  It bubbled under the surface, waiting to breach in passionate triumph.  If Nancy was the ocean, Frank was just desperate to drown.

“I get your drift, Joe. I have lived with your drift for years. I'm saddled with your drift,” Frank intoned in the next room over.  Again, he reprimanded his brother more forcefully than when Nancy was not in the room.  His voice was a rich baritone, and Charleena suppressed a smile as she saved her work.  

She could dig up more than enough to write a fifties-era private eye romance, as this was getting into her head and stirring her creativity.  A plot was already forming of its own accord.  With a sigh, Charleena opened a new document to jot down the bare bones of a plot.

Nancy and Frank laughed together, their voices twining through the air like a stunning display of circling birds, and Charleena committed the sound and imagery of the moment to memory.

After all, it sounded like the line of a story as it formed and took flight.

 


End file.
